The Long Lavender Look Read Online Free PDF Page A

lights coming, we got out of sight."
    "Now why would you do that?" He smiled for the first time. I think it was a smile. The corners of his mouth went up about a sixteenth of an inch.
    So I told him about the nut in the old truck who'd tried to pot us from the truck window, and thought he'd gotten one of us, thought he'd scragged somebody named Hutch, then tried to dicker with the survivor, somebody named Orville. I said it happened about one hour and four miles south of where I had put Miss Agnes into the canal.
    "Describe the truck."
    "An old Ford pickup, rough, noisy, and beat. I think it was red. A junker. Not worth licensing."
    He slowly turned the pages of his pocket notebook. "So, being the innocent law-abiding citizens you people claim to be, you made no attempt to report somebody trying to kill you, either at Page 11

    the time or this morning to either Officer Nagle or to me."
    "Sheriff, neither of us saw the man. The plate was too dirty and the light too weak to read the number. You know your own county better than I do. There are probably a lot of fine citizens living back in the boonies off that road. And there are some very rough ones too, native-born swamp rats and poachers, and people that came a long way to find a place where they're not likely to be found. A long time ago I spent one weekend here in Cypress City, and after I saw how Saturday night was shaping up, I went back to the motel room and put my cash money in the Gideon and went back out with one ten-dollar bill and had what you could call a memorable evening. I don't really much care if your people kill each other, Hyzer. We were just making certain they didn't kill us and then feel apologetic because the dead bodies didn't turn out to be Hutch and Orville. There wasn't any phone booth handy after that clown drove off in his junk truck. I thought of a way I could attract official attention. We could have walked back four miles and I could have dived down and gotten my tow chain out of the tool compartment and heaved it up over the power lines. Then pretcy soon we would have had the use of the CB radio in the Florida Power and Light truck that would show up. I thought of it, and I thought of making a neighborly call at the next house we came to. But I didn't like either of those ideas, Sheriff."
    "McGee, you had bad luck, didn't you? When you lost that car in the canal, you went back to Frank Baither's place and tried to use his old Ford truck, but the battery was too far gone and you couldn't get it started: Then, while you were walking, you did some thinking. Somebody was going to spot that car sooner or later, and it could be traced to you, and that was a risk you couldn't accept. So you had to put something together that sounded good, and get Al Storey to hoist it out of the canal and tow it in."
    "Hyzer, you are one dumb, blind, stubborn man."
    "You have a good act, McGee. So does your partner. Aren't you wondering, a little, why you can't sell it to me?"
    "More than a little."
    "Then there must be a little more bad luck along with what you already know about. Bad luck or judgment. What could you have forgotten? Think about it."
    I thought. "You must have something you like. I don't know what it could be. I will tell you one thing. Don't depend on it. Because whatever it is, it isn't going to prove what you think it proves, no matter how good it looks."
    "You never saw or heard of Frank Baither in your life?"
    "No."
    "You were never inside his house?"
    "Never."
    "I am going to describe an exhibit to you. It will be a part of the file I am going to turn over to the State's attorney. It is an empty envelope addressed to you, at Bahia Mar, date-stamped a week ago, April 17. On the back of it, possibly in your hand, are some notes about highway numbers and street names. It had been folded twice, and had been immersed in water. Do you recognize it from the description?"
    "I think so. Yes. I don't know where you're going with it, though. Jimmy Ames